Gary James' Interview With Kate Anderson Of
Lucy Angel





They've opened for Neal McCoy, Taylor Swift, Montogmery Gentry and Charlie Daniels to name just a few. They've toured China, Japan and Switzerland. Their debut album can be found in Walmart and Target stores. This mother / daughter trio goes by the name of Lucy Angel. We spoke to mother Kate Anderton about Lucy Angel.

Q - I should probably start off by telling you I like the name of your group, Lucy Angel. But nobody in the group is named Lucy, so where did this Lucy Angel come from?

A - Yeah, that is the question. Sometimes (people) will presume they hear Lucy when Lindsay actually says her name. It's from a World War II airplane that my dad flew in. It's sort of a nod to my military up-bringing.

Q - Was your father in Europe or the Pacific?

A - Europe.

Q - Was your father a pilot?

A - He didn't fly. He was in the medical service corps. We were trying to think of names and were looking at the World War II airplanes and logos. We saw that name and thought that's kind of cool. Our producer's wife really honed in on that. Literally we had the hardest time coming up with a name. So, the fact that it would mean something to me and my family was the deciding factor I guess.

Q - I suppose everybody asks you about the name.

A - They do. (laughs)

Q - You have your two daughters involved in the act. Spending so much time together on and off the road, you could find yourselves at each other's throat.

A - That is a very interesting thing. It sort of evolved. Lindsay started singing with another trio I had. I sang with them while the kids were growing up and one of the girls dropped out of the trio. Lindsay was twelve and she jumped in. So, she started entertaining with this other trio of mine at twelve. Then we did a duo after that and actually moved to Nashville as a duo and it took Emily (Kate's other daughter) a year to go, "I want to do this with you guys." So, it was just kind of a natural evolution. We didn't really think about it. We spent a lot of time together anyway. But yes, it's difficult at times, working with your family. You have to treat each other with that respect that you would try not thinking of it being your family at work, that you have a professional attitude. Relationships creep in, but we have a good time. In the end we laugh and have a good time. We get along great.

Q - I'm guessing The Judds would have been the role model for Lucy Angel.

A - Yes. I was a big fan of The Judds. I didn't really think about doing it because of that. It just sort of happened. We didn't plan to do a mother / daughter thing. The opportunity came up to be in the show together and then at that time we got asked to do another one, so we were a duo at that point and decided to record something together and come to Nashville. But I am a huge fan of The Judds.

Q - This record label you record for, G-Force Records, is your own label?

A - It is. It's an independent label. We're not the only project on it, but we were the first project on G-Force.

Q - Do you own the label?

A - It's owned by several people. We have two or three investors that own the label, but we were the first act on the label and basically they were picking us up as their first act.

Q - I see this CD of yours in only available in Walmart and Target.

A - We are available at Walmart and Target, and online you can get it at iTunes and Amazon. But for physical stores, yes, Target and Walmart are the two stores that carry our CD. We're very excited about that.

Q - What would the reasoning be behind that? Is it the idea that more Country fans shop at those stores?

A - Yes. That is sort of the target. A lot of Country fans shop at Target and Walmart. I shop there. I think most people hit those stores at some point.

Q - In the U.S. have you mainly performed as a support act?

A - Yeah. Well, we've toured as far as promoting our song on the radio. We would play with any other acts that might be there to promote their song. Sometimes you do radio shows with two or three other acts that are current on the charts at the time, or we will open for various people. We're not a headlining act yet, but we headlined in China. We headlined their Country music festival.

Q - I was just about to get to that. Overseas you're performing in what type of venues?

A - In China it was huge Country music festival. There were actually acts from all over the world performing at this. We were lucky enough to headline as the act from the U.S. That was just an amazing experience, one that I will never forget. We also performed at the Great Hall Of The People at Beijing as the first actual Western Hemisphere act, which was truly a very unique experience. We toured Europe doing different venues over there. We had our TV show on over in the U.K. It was for a TV show on AXIS to a U.K. show and now it's on Netflix. We're super excited about that.

Q - There are actually fans of Country music in China? That surprises me.

A - I know. It's crazy. It was mind-boggling. It truly blew my mind. We weren't prepared for the reception actually. We thought we would need to do some promotion. We had done that show in Beijing and apparently that had been televised and so when we got to the music festival, people were just amazingly receptive to Country music. Apparently John Denver had made an impact with "Country Roads". It was a huge hit. We actually went into the studio before we went over there and recorded that song. That got a very big reception and also we were requested to do a Chinese Pop song. So, we had to learn a song in Chinese before we went over and that was pretty cool too.

Q - Did you record that song?

A - We didn't record it. I just had our interpreter come over to the house before we went over there. I said, "Don't try to write this out for me. I just want you to speak this phonetically and I'm going to write it the way I hear it." Apparently it was good enough that they understood the song we were doing. Chinese is a difficult language. We tried to do a little bit of learning online. Just enough to be gracious and answer a few questions, but oh my gosh, there's just so many inferences. It can mean three different things, the same word, depending on how you sing it.

Q - Does Taylor Swift personally approve of her opening acts? Do you know the answer to that?

A - I don't know the answer. I would hope so.

Q - Did anyone ever tell you not to upstage Taylor Swift?

A - Oh, heck, you can't upstage Taylor Swift. I think she's so talented. I don't know anybody that could really upstage her.

Q - Are you able to ask for certain lights on stage and a certain sound?

A - It's pretty much set what everybody gets as an opening act. Out of respect for the headliner they have the bigger portion of the stage. That's just sort of the way it goes.

Q - But you can still get your show across, can't you?

A - Of course. We performed in all sorts of configurations with just ourselves, acoustically, which is actually one of my favorite ways to perform. Sometimes just a guitar player with us, up to a full band with six people behind us.

Q - So, you don't have your own band that travels with you?

A - We do when we do big shows. There's just different situations where of course for radio you're going to do an acoustic set. You can do it with yourself, another guitar player.

Official Website: www.LucyAngel.com

© Gary James. All rights reserved.